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Tunisian Grilled Salad with Tuna | Salata Mishwiyya

Usually, the food we grill stays whole. We put it on a bun, or we eat it with our hands. But today’s Tunisian Grilled Salad takes a different approach. The charred vegetables – peppers, onion, tomatoes – are pulsed together into a chunky mixture, then served with flaked tuna, and hard boiled egg.

This salad has body.

Much of the intensity comes off the grill, from the raw garlic, hot chili peppers, and the caraway seeds, all of which can be tempered to taste.

Please, please, please… let this salad meld for at least an hour before eating.

Landscape in Tozeur–Nefta International Airport (Tunisia). Photo by Gloumouth1.

Next up?

Grill the tomatoes, bell peppers, chili peppers, and onion over medium heat. Remove each vegetable after it is cooked through and charred. The onion will take the longest. The entire process will take somewhere between 15 and 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, mash together the garlic, caraway seeds, and salt until it forms a paste.

Tip: If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, you could try crushing the garlic and using half ground caraway and half whole caraway seeds. The garlic might have more bite this way, though, because the pieces will be bigger.

This is how mine looked after a good pound.

Peel and roughly chop all the grilled veggies. Add them to the bowl of a food processor with the garlic mixture (you may want to stir in the garlic mixture to taste; it is extremely potent). Pulse several times until chunky and well mixed.

Add in the garlic mixture and season with salt, to taste.

Refrigerate about an hour before serving.

Squeeze lemon juice over the top, drizzle with a happy stream of olive oil. Pile on the tuna, then garnish with eggs, olives, and lemon wedges.

Serve with pita bread.

I like it best about room temperature, or slightly cooler.

Ava likes it best in a pita sandwich.Smart cookie.

What about you? Do you find this salad appealing? I think caraway seed is the most polarizing ingredient in here… Keith sniffed it out immediately. Are you a fan? If not, how would you modify the recipe to suit your tastes?

Votes: 1
Rating: 5
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Usually, the food we grill stays whole. We put it on a bun, or we eat it with our hands. But today's Tunisian Grilled Salad takes a different approach. The charred vegetables - peppers, onion, tomatoes - are pulsed together into a chunky mixture, then served with flaked tuna, and hard boiled egg.
UPDATED 2015: Caraway cut down from 1 Tbsp to 1 teaspoon.Tunisian Grilled Salad with Tuna | Salata Mishwiyya

Grill the tomatoes, bell peppers, chili peppers, and onion over medium heat. Remove each vegetable after it is cooked through and charred. The onion will take the longest. The entire process will take somewhere between 15 and 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, mash together the garlic, caraway seeds, and salt until it forms a paste.

Peel and roughly chop all the grilled veggies. Add them to the bowl of a food processor with the garlic mixture (you may want to stir in the garlic mixture to taste; it is extremely potent).

Pulse several times until chunky and well mixed.

Add in the garlic mixture and season with salt, to taste.

Refrigerate about an hour before serving.

Squeeze lemon juice over the top, drizzle with a happy stream of olive oil. Pile on the tuna, then garnish with eggs, olives, and lemon wedges.

My younger son eats a wide variety of food and is fairly open to new things. There are only about 4 things he does not eat. They are mushrooms, tomato chunks, peppers, canned tuna. See what I am up against here? My older son eats only 4 things. Sometimes I tell them I am making something for me not them, so too bad. I will try this for the adventure; that’s what I am here for. There is no doubt, we will all like the samsa, however.

To answer your queston to us Sasha: “What about you? Do you find this salad appealing? Are you a fan? If not, how would you modify the recipe to suit your tastes?” As an American: 1. It does not look appealing to me to even try. Maybe if it were served on some crisp iceburg lettuce, it would look more appealing? 2. it does not look or sound like a “salad” receipe to be eaten as a meal. It looks to be more of a ‘relish’ type receipe. I would definetely eliminate the caraway and garlic… but, it would be interesting to taste it with just a tiny touch of caraway & garlic.

EWE! CARAWAY! Sorry but this is my most hated herb – For me it has ruined so many good foods! LOL! Anyway I agree with the “relish” look of the recipe. I would want to dress it up with something bright red and green, and make a kind of layered pita sandwich – lettuce, Tunisia stuff (without the caraway), tuna and chopped egg and maybe tomato, then drissel of olive oil & lemon juice. But what to do about the caraway, which is probably the key Tunisian ingredient to make this authentic? Mumm – how about thyme? That would go lovely with all the other flavors and the lemon and olive oil and garlic (there is NEVER too much garlic). Actually I think this would be a yummy recipe without the caraway and dressed up pretty in a pita sandwich. Sorry everyone else thought it might look and taste like the cat’s spitup but with a bit of a twist it could be very good (not authentic however, oh well). Love. your blog, so sorry to see it’s going to be over too soon.

Hi Robin: your comment about “garlic” makes me think of a ‘dish’ that was served in Russia that I will call ‘a garlic caserole. Ingredients: garlic, garlic, and garlic haha. I think you would love it ‘maybe’…

I actually thought this looks yummy! It seems to be close to another dish with grilled eggplants, and then mashed
It also seems perfect for a oven free menu these sweltering days!
Even if we don’t like something, or its unfamiliar, isn’t that the whole point of this exercise to see the
world through another’s eyes.
I’m sure that a lot of the world would find some of our American dishes strange and unappetizing as well!

Even without the caraway (ick!), I couldn’t serve this to my family. Too chopped-up looking. And I don’t eat anything fire-grilled and charred. Sorry – but I do like the idea of almost all of your other recipes.

I have to disagree with the above comments, I think it looks great. We ate this Salad when we stayed in Tunisia for 2 months in a beautyful rural village and yours looks exactly like the one the local women made. I still remember us sitting outside and grilling the vegetables. Also the canned tuna is an original part of this recipe (I love it too !). Surprisingly there grow many vegetables, we also had a garden from which we ate watermelon, melon, tomatoes, peppers, onions, olives, pomgranate, potatoes and dates. And we lived in the south, i.e. between the desert and the ocean and I was surprised seeing those vegetables and fruits grow so fast in a soil made up from different kinds of sand (desert, beach). In this region they don’t add spices though.

I skipped the tuna as that I bought smelled bad. The flavors were a little strong, BUT and big BUT, I had leftovers tonight. I piled it on a pita squired some lemon and drizzled olive oil on. Wow, was I surprised. It was sooooo good. I had only let it sit and hour or so before trying it last night. Now I know: give it a full day. It is delicious now and I still have a little left for lunch tomorrow.

I’m American and my husband is Tunisian. This is a very common dish for him, back home. I love the dish myself (minus the tuna, as I’m not much of a fish eater). So, we make this dish with and without tuna (or I eat around the tuna). I also love the heat you get from the dish and we don’t use the caraway either. We eat it with lots of crusty bread or Turkish bread (no pita).

I’m also an American married to a Tunisian and have watched my MIL make this salad a zillion times. Firstly, it is delicious. She makes it using a little charcoal stove that everyone seems to have and just sticks the veggies directly into the fire. Sometimes she mixes it up by adding an eggplant. She usually also puts the garlic clove in the fire too. Second, I think caraway is misleading. Caraway is one component of a spice blend commonly used in Tunis called “tabil.” It is not available here in the states but I’ve watched it being made. It’s essentially sun dried Tunisian bhaklouti peppers, garlic, caraway, and garlic. I may be leaving out something…but you take this mixture, let it dry in the hot sun, and then grind it into a fine powder. Tunisians put it in everything. I actually bring back sacks of it to use here. The taste of caraway is therefore more subtle when using tabil. Thirdly, tuna. It’s a Tunisian thing. They put it on everything, including pizza. I don’t really understand why you would put tuna on pizza and my husband doesn’t understand why we don’t eat pizza with tuna. Tunis is a Mediterranean country so fresh Mediterranean tuna is easy to come by (yes, a portion of Tunis is Sahara desert but the majority of people live in the coastal beach cities so those camels are misleading) so that may have something to do with it. I like my slata sans tuna, but I make it mainly with so my hubby can enjoy…

It’s a yummy spice blend for sure. I add it to other foods, randomly when cooking. Chili powder, tabil, salt, pepper pretty much sums up the spice cabinet at our house…P.S. my husband says your salata looks spot on. And then he asked pretty please for me to make it…so we’re salat-ing it up this week thanks to you 😀

I am choked by some of the negative comments. I am Tunisian and this is one of my favourite dish to eat and to make. And if you don’t like this recipe, why don’t you go to Mac Donald’s and eat your disgusting hamburgers. I can’t believe there are actually people who say ahhh I won’t serve this to my family!
Well I would not let my kids eat junk food and Turkey and gravy either, but at least I don’t go and leave some nasty comments

I wanted to write specifically to thank you for the time it took in putting together this wonderfully creative and heartwarming recipe. I loved your photographs, the lay out and the final photos of your precious child with the look of overwhelming anticipation on her little face. If a child is that excited, then the final result must be spectacular. I too am choked up with the negative comments. Unnecessary hurt….thankfully it is minor in comparison to your fantastic efforts and end result. I am definitely going to make this
P.S……….I love camels……..

My husband is Tunisian and we eat this a lot in Tunisia. They usually grill everything on coals, which I think gives it extra taste, and their peppers are slightly different, not as sweet as ours. I’m definitely going to give it a go with English peppers though. It’s simple, healthy and tasty eaten in the traditional way with lots of bread to scoop it up. Yummy 🙂

Thanks for the advise it is great !
My little addition to all this may be reside in the type of pepper. I think the so called Moroccan pepper Long rather than round does add mighty to the taste of salata Mechouia. I know sometimes it is a bit difficult to find it in all supermarkets but surely Asia or local markets sell it.

Also, the sweet olive oil rather than italian acidy oil.
Thanks to the sandy soil and rich in Phosphate as natural fertiliser, the Tunisian olive oil has nearly 0% acidity. Also the Moroccan olive oil is nice. I know the shelves in the UK are monopolised by Spanish or Italian oilve oil but if you get a chance to order some from oil press from Tunisia or Morocco is lifetime bargain …beleive me it is sweet, tasty and add a huge taste to your cooking and of course to our TUNISIAN GRILLED SALADE Salata Mechouia.

Some people (in Tunisia my native home) use capres, egg, olives, and a leaf of mint on top
All up to you

Its A Tunisian kind of salad and it goes with freshly baked french baguette so u can dip it in the salad.its not meant to be just eaten just like that ,its not like a ceasar salad or green salad.

It might not look appealing but it taste yummy and love eating Mediterranean dishes because they pretty much eat eveything with fresh baguette and love the simple red and green leaf lettuce with persian cucumner,red onions with simple olive oil,salt n pepper and fresh squeeze lemon juice.Perfect esp now that its Ramadan.

Hi,
Just wanted to say thank you so much for this recipe. My boyfriend is to Tunisian and really likes this sohe wanted me to try it, so he sent me this recipe. I wasn’t too sure when I looked at it but after I made it, it is going to be one of my favorites. Thank you so much for sharing an authentic Tunisian recipe.